nonjic

I just use the flexy hose (looks bit like garden hose pipe) from a hydraulic / air supply place, comes in 50 mtr coils and is hastle free to run. If its near a danger point (hot or run over by fork lift !) run it down the inside of some old steel pipe / conduit. This lazy approach avoids loads of potential leak points / joints, and if you do get the odd leak its easy to replace the whole lot. Ive seen the odd 1/2 pipe 'pop' off an airtool which is your worst case scenario (dumps the whole tank) - (using a jubilee clip over a 'snap on' fitting) , this is waaaaayyyyy more dangerous than a permanantly piped shop line starting leakin a bit. Chains only as strong as the weakest link etc now I did once pop a 4" dia 'flexy' off the inlet of a double acting air stamp, it dumped a LOT of 120psi in a very short space of time, fourtunatly the steel pipes up to the flexy were secured or could have been worse than a bit of deafness for a few days - the laundery bill was high that day..:rolleyes:

Bruce, put my name down for it, so long as you include shipping to manchester (ferry costs included Imagedude, quite wise! - I speak to alot of blacksmiths, the conversation generally goes along the line of ' " What hammer have you got then ? " " a 2cwt, (or 3, 5cwt), got it real cheap " "cool, any good?" " well, its in the yard at the moment, ive not quite put it in yet " The only power hammer that is really any good at all is the one thats in your shop, hammering ! (the ebay ones still at

I might buy it yet (if its cheap enough - its remarkably difficult to make money from used small hammers, factor in a bit of transport (with a hiab), bit of cleaning up, putting it under power to test it, few bits of repairs, waiting 6 months to find a buyer, being haggled down by said buyer, constant Q & A for a couple of weeks after they install it (no site visits if your lucky) - rent, rates, yada yada yada a

thats as sweet as they get for the small shop, in my opinion - and rarer than rocking horse droppings, most folks wont sell them once theyve got em, note the integral anvil - no pit foundation :)

Dodge, sorry mate, I wasnt saying one hammer was better than another - it makes no odds to me, 99% of my works in industrial forging - I was just suggesting ways of minimising collateral damage from a hammer! I dont know what the biggest size of Phoenix hammer that has been made is, but suspect its a lot smaller than 1000lbs The page just annoys me slightly because a) a heavy hammer frame does not make a good hammer, since it aint anvil mass. (a big flame cut is cheaper than a pattern and casting) Cast Iron can be a superior material for a hammer frame as it deadens the vibration shock loading to the bearings etc in the machine, as we know, steel rings! - specifically calling my companies products 'past it' is beyond a joke, with over 140 years in production, and our machines making many of the parts for eurofighter, JSF airbus A380 etc Steel makes a good anvil, a cast iron power hammer block works much like a cast 'blacksmiths' anvil with steel top, i.e very effectivly. rant over Chris, I use James Walker Group - Machinery mounts (the TICO s pads) this page has some good info Fabreeka

m, if your dreaming of the future may I suggest the following for your dream shop....... 1, small power hammer, an everyday user, somthing like a 50lb lg or airhammer, 2, bigger hammer, somthing like a 300lb / 500lb nazel (well, a Massey would be better really) - you will only use it for the same size work as your small hammer, but it will impress you mates... 3, a nice, fast acting hydraulic press, 100 / 150 tons, you can use this for the same purpose as no 2, above or for some real nice knife billet forging. 4, a small 'Grant' induction heater (to those in the know would these work on 50hz without mods and would they be good for 300 heats hour on the end of 12mm titanium for bolt heading?). 5, qty 6 anvils, you will only use 1 of them most of the time but you will out anvil t.p m, seriously your best bet is to get good at a job with a mass market, programming , databasing etc - you might not think it now but get good at it and you will earn more than enough from this to have a better hobby shop than most full time smiths and you can work from home , (no offence full time smiths, :)

ever seen the film ' The Fly' ? I spent an hour wire brushing with a pistol drill a load of old spring swages, a couple of days later a hair on my arm seemed unusually coarse... . tweezers and yup, wire, fired stright into the muscle. over the next couple of weeks about 6 appeared, very lucky not to get blood poisioning. I NEVER use them now. full stop. im scared of them, and I use some hardcore machinery :o

the T.P.A.A.F.T used to be a closly guarded secret, I guess with 5 in the forge the secret techneques can be made public.. :rolleyes:

Good grief mate, are you trolling here ??? , cant make a pair of working tongs, cant afford $160 for a used anvil, now $ 1000 to pay for 2 ? designing a forge for 2 students ? put concrete in a forge ...... make your mind up. Im not flaming this, but people are free and open with their advice and time, just be honest - your not trying to, or going to 'impress' anyone with non existand budgets and workshops, skill levels etc. its a small community, youll just end up looking silly. Ask, listen, read, learn, people will help you out. I hope its just youthfull enthusiam and you do have a passion for the craft, but keep it real eh :)

Chris, The best thing to use is an 'isopolymer cork' along the base, and a void filler (expended polystyrene will do) alternative strips along the base of your 'septic tank', then line the walls of your pit with a void filler, and a capping strip around the top with the cork material. Seal it all up with duct tape and pour the inertia block. This leaves a 'floating' inertia block when the viod filler disintergrates. Ive acheived measured 98% virbration attenuation on 3 ton (ram weight) hammers using this technique, its a 10th of the cost of 'spring box' foundation, the absolute best! The 'cork' can be bought from Fabreeka, or James Walker ( TICO pads) - they charge you mega bucks if you get them to design the foundation (and they disclaim all liability as far as effectiveness goes :mad:, but the materials arent to dear if you know what your asking for. Hope this helps a little.

that page is a load of total, complete bobbins (the cast iron fever bit) I would trust that no more for foundation advice than I would trust me for knitting advice. If you dis-credit yourself on one piece of advice information / , how can you expect people to trust you on others ? (John, @ Johns Hammer emporium, perveyor of some of the finest cast iron (well over 20,000 of em, still industry standard best) Massey hammers... )) - (im not saying they are bad hammers, but tell me how many of them have been double shifted, tool steel forging for 50 years and still going strong....:)

Bump, back to the top of the list for this one..... im 32, (and therefore still pretty well invincible in my mind) I had always taken a 'dont nanny me' attitude to PPE untill a couple of years ago, sat in a quiet pub a couple of years ago I found myself saying 'what' , 'you what' 'sorry mate' 'eeehh' every time one of my mates spoke, they thought I was winding them up and took the p*ss, and I had a sudden realisation of what the future could hold for me, and it was scary. thank God it was only temporary, I now use the little 'EAR' yellow fellows mentioned above, if you buy a box of *250 / 500* pairs they are almost free. I feel a bit naked without them. I find high frequency noise the worst, grinders etc. I dont wear them all the time, more a pop in when needed thing when its LOUD, My top tip, always keep them in the same pocket (top right overalls for me) , it becomes second nature, you know the thing, phone right trousers, cigs top left - get so you dont have to think about it.

I would be wary of putting 2" of rubber under it, it will bounce - which is annoying to say the least, but will also result in a vertical hammering motion on the holding down bolts which will cause them to rip out or fail in no time. If you are trying to attenuate the vibration I could write a thesis on it ! - the trick is plenty of mass, and having no point of your isolated interia block in contact with the surrounding ground - the vibration will find the contact point and transmit. If you google 'Fabreeka' it may show some isometric views of inertia blocks for a few ideas. Sit down if you ask them for a price on any of the materials though you can get away with a fairly thin slab, if you have a large contact area between the hammer and the slab - we scrape the timbers between hammer and slab to give as near 100% bedding as we can (think of a small contact area like a fullering die, it will break down the concrete / metal very quick !)

so are we talking solid cobalt drills, or hss with a coating?

ive not really got much experiance on the kinion air hammers (there not as popular in the UK), But I think that this guy has got a cracking hammer deisgn that looks similar, YouTube - air hammer functional walk through If I was building one I would have this clip in my favourites file ! - theres another clip from the same guy on there worth a watch. john.

on a boat i doubt a spirit level / box square would be much use ! what most c/l turners will never admit is if the tollerance is really critical to a thou, or better than .001" then its a grinding job, and they are only roughing it out :o

to even further add to the confusion our large vertical borer (132" table dia) has 2 toolposts (columns) one on the right as your facing the machine (3 o'clock if you like) and one on the left (9 o'clock), so you have the left tool facing back, and the right tool facing forward ! Your very own IFI Ian seemed to get a bit hypnotised by this particular machine edit....... errm ok the other way round right hand tool as you face the machine, cutting tip facing back... etc..., you can see where the confusion arrises !

one of the clutches gave way on our rusky lathe so it would only run in reverse (clockwise, ie away from where your standing,) we put the tool in the holder upside down and it worked, kinda! hope this adds to the confusion :)

To be honest ive never used a colbalt drill bit, for that matter ive never seen one used!(and ive worked in heavy engineering for a bit) , we sometimes used to use colbalt or stellite when turning pot hard material, but never used them for drill, course its all C.B.N and ceramics now, I buy sets of the TiNi coated HSS bits (not sure of the brand) for approx

spend the money on good quality, titanium nitride coated drill bits, they fall through most materials. With a good quality bit and a very poor drill you can do alot more work. If you have got lots of 20mm + holes to drill a "roto broach" magnetic 'slugger' is the best. these are like a little hollow milling cutter. They leave a little 'plug' of steel that falls through the plate. you can drill a hole in seconds. Johns Top tip of the day...... if you are drilling a large ish hole with a hand held drill do not 'lock' the power on with the little side toggle, just lightly hold the main switch right at the end. if the drill grabs, which WILL happen sooner or later it stops (well massivly reduces the chances) of it spraining / breaking you wrist.

Blackbeard, If you havent already I would try out a few of the 'home made' hammers before you build one, if youve had a go on a Massey it is a world apart from any DIY hammer (and the new gereration of commercially available hammers) , you might end up very disapointed with what you build - Bigger (seperate anvil hammers) can be bought very cheaply if you scout round enough - ( though obviously you will cop it on transport & installation costs :)

jmc - Im a newb here but have a bit of experience on making hammer bits, if you really want to increase the life of the dies I would dress some proper rads into the corners of the dovetails (especially the sow block) - you've got some major stress raisers there at the most common failure point. Youve gone pretty sharp in the corners so you may have to undercut them a bit, but they will stil be a whole lot stronger than they are now. If you use the edge of a blue flap disc in a 4 1/2" grinder you can get smooooooth rads real quick.